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From Our Own Correspondent: Ukraine: The view from the Donbass

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A woman walks past a destroyed hospital building, Russian-controlled Ukraine, 29 January, 2023

30/09/2023 GMT

Ukraine: The view from the Donbass

BBC World Service - From Our Own Correspondent, Ukraine: The view from the Donbass

Civilians in Russian-speaking areas bear their own traumas after years of war

The grievances of Russian-speaking zones in Ukraine's east; roadblocks to reporting on Niger; the Syrian families seeking the missing; can fog-catchers solve Peru's water worries?

The fate of the Donbass - Ukraine's eastern industrial belt, where a majority of people are Russian speakers - is at the heart of the current war. It's not easy for outsiders, especially from the Western press, to gauge public opinion in the breakaway regions of Donetsk and Lugansk. So Nick Sturdee spoke to some of the people he's met there over the year to hear what they have been through since 2014. 

Niger's capital, Niamey, has seen daily, noisy demonstrations of support for the military junta which mounted a coup at the end of July and ousted the elected president, Mohamed Bazoum. The country's new rulers have mobilised mass discontent with French influence and involvement in Niger - and France has agreed to withdraw its diplomats and troops. But how deep is the Nigerien people's backing for the junta - and how long will it last? Mayeni Jones found plenty of obstacles to reporting on its future on a recent journey into Niger.

Although Syria's government has enjoyed a partial international rehabilitation in recent months - with its President Bashar al Assad welcomed back into meetings of the Arab League - the Syrian people's suffering is not over. Hundreds of thousands of households are still missing their loved ones who were killed, imprisoned or disappeared by the security forces. Many of them have paid out huge sums for any information on what happened to their relatives, as Lina Sinjab describes.

And from one of the world's driest cities, Peter Yeung reports on an ingenious technical fix to the problem of supplying water to homes. It almost never rains in Peru's capital, Lima - but the city's fast-growing suburbs need water for cooking, washing, drinking and growing food. Could a clever network of 'fog catchers' harvest usable water from thin air?

Producer: Polly Hope
Production Co-ordinator: Gemma Ashman

(Photo: A woman walks past a destroyed hospital building in the settlement of Novoaidar, Luhansk region, Russian-controlled Ukraine, 29 January, 2023. Credit: Alexander Ermochenko/Reuters)

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